Your Moment of Funny

Religion in a comic universe

There are two primary schools of thoughts regarding how the events that occur in a superhero comic universe would impact religion.

1) No fundamental change - sure there might spring up the occasional flash cult for a certain superhero (this happens to Superman occasionally), but for the most part, things would stay the same, with the superheroes with the names of mythological gods dismissed as impersonators or just guys who liked the name.
2) Major fundamental changes with entire religious structures dedicated to superbeings.

Both of these are a little simplistic, and don't really account for all factors.

First, the argument that the mythology-based superheroes are simply extra-dimensional beings is a double edged sword - while it could be used to keep a Church of Thor from springing up, it would also be used by the Richard Dawkins types to discredit contemporary religious figures. It doesn't take much imagination to see how "Christ was a Mutie!" could have a very fractious impact on modern Christianity, and the same holds true of every other modern religion. After all, once you've argued that one "god" is a super-alien, it opens the door to say they all are/were - which reduces every religion to a simple affiliation - like picking which sports team is your favorite or your political party identification.

The flip side of course, would be the false messiahs - as every fringe radical religious organization with minimal scruples and maximum ambition would be promoting their own "super-savior" figure - a mutant or meta or enhanced or enchanted human to use to promote that theirs is the one true way. This promotion would likely involve a bodycount.

Next, with the frequent Resurrections of famous superbeings, the question of the afterlife would seem answered - particularly with the existence of someone like the Spectre or the firsthand accounts of superhumans who've been beyond the veil (Green Arrow, Superman, the Fantastic Four, etc). Of course, every reporter and theologian on Earth would be constantly hounding them for exact details of their experiences to try and match them with their own belief systems. And in areas where they would conflict, one would imagine religious scholars and pundits of all stripes to do their best to discredit the accounts entirely. Of course, discrediting does nothing to solve the larger issue of what happened, as the alternatives lead to a lot of questions - particularly "why do only super-people, even ones without powers, come back from the dead?" And there are no good answers there.

And of course, you could start looking into all sorts of things the existing religious institutions would be trying to maintain legitimacy or, if possible, claim supremacy. It's not too much of a stretch from real life to imagine a group of Vatican scientists (no, that's not an oxymoron - go read it for yourself) using a dimensional portal to contact Heaven, and accidentally opening a portal to, let's say, the Dark Dimension or Apokalips.

So, needless to say, the oversimplification of religion in comics, while it is done for good reasons to avoid offending sensibilities, does close off some rather amusing story opportunities.

Superfolks and the problems with good satire

OK, so one of my birthday gifts this year was a copy of Superfolks.

The good news is that I thought it was very good and worth a read...but....

Part of what a good satire should do, regardless of whatever genre it's lampooning, is effectively capture the zeitgeist, and the flavor and culture of the times. Superfolks does this really well, but that's part of the problem for a modern reader - if you have no idea who the characters in "All in the Family", "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" or the minor figures of 1970s American political scene, some of the jokes fall flat.

This strikes as me as part of the problem with modern "deconstructionism" in supercomics - while they do alright at lampooning superhero genre tropes, they rarely tie in those tropes to the times people are living in. The fiction is a reflection of the larger culture it's in, and by not getting the proper context, modern superhero satire is just a satire of a subculture, and not the larger culture that creates and shapes it. Without this element, the audience is challenged to have the correct context necessary to appreciate just how much is being satirized.

Gamer Post On!

Sick Week Day 4

The heck with it, let's call it Gamer week, shall we?

I really don't think I'm going to have much to say about comics until after SDCC and all that news filters out and I've digested it, so let's go with this, ok?

Thirty for 30, Part 2

Gone on Vacation

Sorry to have been gone so long, only to have to tell you I'm not going to be able to post for a little while longer.

Rest assured, I'm working on lots of new posters and blogposts, and I'll try to get back to regular posting soon.

Pick the best caption!

WE ARE LEGION

OK, so posting unfortunately is going to be very irregular for the next few months, but I'll hope you can bear with me.

So, in honour of their upcoming appearance of Smallville, I'm just going to talk a little bit about the Legion of Superheroes.

Truth to tell, the only reason I care about the Legion at all? Because Chris Bird taught me to care. DC, if you would like cash money from me, pay Chris Bird to write the Legion of Superheroes.

Now that said, I don't know, understand, or pretend to care about Legion continuity, or what kind of a mess it is. I simply see flying superheroes in the future and punching spaceships and I'm happy. I'm simple like that.

Now, that said, there's something about the Legion I just find baffling, and maybe one of you wise people would like to explain it to me.

Alright, let's say you're walking around downtown, and you happen to see a bank robbery become a hostage situation. The cop cars roll in, as does the SWAT van. And when the SWAT van opens up, you see a bunch of US Civil War re-enacters pour it out in period uniforms, armed to the teeth with automatic weapons, rockets, grenade launchers, and shotguns. They have badges. And not one of them is over 20 years old.

What would scare you more:

A) That they exist?

B) That they are more effective than the 'regular' SWAT team?

Because, really, that's how I see the Legion. They are a group of really, really enthusiastic young people whom have patterned themselves off a bygone era, and practice the methods of that era in the modern day. And they have the authority to go pretty much wherever they want and do as they please for the most part. And they're teenagers. Oh, and occasionally they travel through time, doing whatever they please, and they regularly bring back major historic figures to show them their clubhouse and collection of memorabilia.

That is both fundamentally awesome and crazy.

That's why I like the Legion.

Your Moment of Funny

Things I love about comics

Because sometimes I just don't show enough love, you know? So, here's somethings I just thing are super in comics:

GIANT ROBOTS!

(True Fact: the X-Men LOOOOVE it when Giant Killer Robots show up at their Doorstep)

GALACTUS (Still one of the top 10 greatest things ever created in comics)

Warren Ellis (when he's not working for Marvel):

Bad-Ass Fight Scenes!

The Evil Opposite of the Hero!

Tell me about what you love in your superhero comics.

Superman has a Message for Peter Petrelli

And that goes double for Clark on "Smallville". If there is anyone left watching that show that seriously believes that the version of Clark Kent on that show can POSSIBLY become any version of Superman that we've seen in any other medium, then god bless you, because I can't see it.

If I might expand my commentary beyond the limited confines of the funnybooks for a moment, can I just say what a shitkicking the very concept of heroism has received in our cynical age? I mean, have we become so debased that we don't even know what it looks like? Heroes and Smallville strike me as two glaring examples of how bad it has gotten; Heroes has exactly one character that I think meets the classical definition of the term: Hiro (yeah, inspired isn't it?). The rest are reluctant type heroes at best, and others are taken to be deluded or self-interested. Even those with generally good intentions (such as Hiro) are treated as being naive, foolish, and idiotic. Meanwhile, Peter Petrelli, whom is supposedly "the best of us" is self-absorbed, emo brat of a human being that I find completely unrelatable in any fashion. Yet, the writers keep trying to simultaneously force the notion that he is "The Hero" of the show will heaping angst on him (Notice now how he's managed to destroy the life of every woman he's involved with? Woot! He's like Spider-Man! Joey Quesada Approves!). And the less said about Smallville, the better.

It just doesn't fit for me. Maybe because in my own life, I've seen and met people who embodied heroic qualities. My family, teachers, people in my community; people who genuinely and unironically stood up for SOMETHING, even with the odds hopelessly stacked against them, but felt that they couldn't back down because they knew that SOMETHING WAS AT STAKE. Their struggles were rarely easy: They had to face mindless bureaucracy, apathetic crowds, and even hostile and powerful people determine to crush them. It wasn't even a question of "winning", it was a matter of principle; to them it was whether they could face their families with the basic human dignity of knowing that they were true to their beliefs and that they could claim honestly and humbly that they fought the good fight. These were people who tried very hard to set an example for others, and they worked selflessly to try and raise the bar for others to aspire to.

Are we so devoid of any kind of genuine empathy for others, or do we simply feel it is too hard to set bars for ourselves, and instead to pick apart the weaknesses (genuine or otherwise) of others? Me, I'd rather spend a lifetime trying to work for the betterment of everyone and live modestly than to attain the highest levels of wealth and power but without any values left to my name. And just once in a while, I would like to see more of that reflected in the fiction in my mediums, and it is becoming increasingly rare. So now and again, when I'll find it (as I have with Geoff Johns' recent Action Comics Arc; hey, this may be the Fan Fiction era of comics as Alan calls it, but every once in a while, there's at least good fanfiction), I'll celebrate it. And I hope you'll join me.

Heroes inspire us

Heroes challenge us to do better

Heroes make us believe

Heroes set the example

Heroes try every day

Heroes may not always win, but they never chose the easy way out.

(Edited to ADD: Sorry, I should probably explain this part a little better for those of you not following Action Comics. The guy on the receiving end of that roundhouse is Earth Man (formerly Absorbancy Lad) whom was a rejected applicant for the Legion of Superheroes. He has the power to copy the abilities of any and every superbeing he comes in contact with. In the course of this story, Earthman here has become a thinly veiled human supermacist whom has terrorized the entire planet and gone after the Legion for his rejection. He spends a lot of time whining about how he didn't get his chance and how he deserved it. I found the whininess combined with his powerset to be very evocative of Peter Petrelli form Heroes, so to me it's a metaphor. Your mileage may vary.)

In my Perfect Comic Universe...

Alright, for those of you whom have been paying attention, you can see that I have a lot of strong opinions on comics, especially the ones getting put out these days by the so-called "Big Two" of Marvel and DC. Now, some of you may think I'm being overly cynical and just an angry crack. Well, there's a reason for that. See, I've spent a lot of time looking over the comic blogosphere, and I had an epiphany: we'd all be much better off if Marvel and DC's characters were public domain. Now, here me out, yes, we'd also have a lot of crap out there by the likes of Millar, Miller, Loeb and...wait a minute, isn't that exactly what we have NOW? So yeah, maybe it would be better if we handed off some of these properties to rabid fans who could do it right.

Here is just a sampling of the comics that would exist if the universe were in any way, shape or form just:

-Christopher Bird’s Legion of Superheroes








-Chris Sims Iron Fist and the Punisher beat the crap out of everyone




-Dave Campbell’s Totally Awesome X-Men

-Mike Sterling’s Swamp Thing

-Dwayne McDuffie's Justice League book with half decent fucking art and not perpetually tied down into crossovers no one gives a shit about!




-Bully the Little Stuffed Bull's P.G. Wodehouse tales staring The Thing!




-Dorian Wright’s Wildcat All-Leather Spectacular

-George Perez's I'm going to draw Superheroines and lots of detailed backgrounds and you are going to LOVE IT!



-Jeff Parker's Agents of Atlas



-Scott’s Hawk and Dove, featuring Dr. Mid-Nite!
-Ragnell’s Green Lantern Corps Swimsuit spectacular starring Kyle Rayner’s butt


What would you like to see in YOUR perfect comic universe? Go ahead and put it in the comments.